Brain waste, funny taste

An article I came across in the JAMA on health worker migration alludes to what they call " Brain waste"- skilled migrant workers are unable to find work in their area of expertise and end up working in unrelated low-paying jobs.

Exotic sounding word.No neurons being tossed into the bin.But compelling on the idea of why people mix up career and life.People have very quaint ideas when they make the switch.

While I must admit at forth that I am no sage on this, I have heard mixed views.
For people like DRK, working in resource poor areas was a brain waste.That its no use working for excellence when you are fighting with red tape and cost cutting all the time. It is funny, none of my teachers have given me negative feedback on that.Not Dilip Mathai, not DRK, not Kaka.
Hardik was honest to admit that its all about money.
One friend of mine, now an intern in MI told me that he came here with romantic notions that what he saw in western movies about a open country and 'promiscuous' lifestyle was true.
"Tab life mein aish karne ka aise lagta tha"

There's a whole bunch in KEM and BJ who think the Mah government is going crazy on bond issues, trying to bulldoze its way through on its supposedly moral high ground, and count it as wise investment to rather spend time and money in making it to elsewhere.

Abhijit said he wants to learn interventional pulmono skills.Charudutt said the same thing when he first came.Learning skills.Lot of things have changed since.

Lifestyle is a major draw.But I presume that means cleaner roads, more taxes, being distanced from near and dear ones,loneliness, nice big cars,safety, subtle racism. It is a mixed bag, really.It is about making choices based on priorities.As Dhiraj says," i would rather be a first class citizen in a second class country than be a second class citizen in a first class country."
No one person is right or wrong here.Just that 'results might vary based on experience.'

Many medical students seem to do so because it is a fashionable thing to do.All the batch toppers are doing it.It catches on as a trend in places like MAMC or AIIMS, where Ramadoss has to address the convocation thus:" don't go away. And if you do, please come back."In my MD batch I am the only one who chose to give my USMLE. In the batch after mine, half the batch is already interviewing.

Renita gave me a totally new perspective: of parents of unmarried girls equating getting married to someone in the US and going there as being an indicator of success in life. I got registered on shaadi.com, just to test the waters and am already put off and shall be deleting my profile.


These are individual anecdotal experiences, a bit colorful,but unsupported by sexy stats.For a more detailed discussion read the WHO fact sheet on this. But I gather, at least from the Pinoy experience, everything starts with an individual experience, an anecdote, a word of mouth, which people tend to trust.Then when things get big, people become numbers, more reliable.

If anyone does read my blog, your experiences are welcome.